Tie-downs/ Yes or No??

   I guess, if I had to have a rule of thumb about details, it would be: If you can't understate the detail, it should probably be left off.   A small detail that overpowers, is a distraction. You can try various methods of representing the detail, off model, and if you find a method that works, go ahead with it.

I say pass too, agreeing that they might overpower the model. Personally found it hard enough getting a reasonably perfect circle when I tried them on Tamiyas 1/350th Enterprise, & that is with markings to follow molded on the deck.

Even if you could achieve smaller dots, how far are people viewing the carrier likely to be away from it. If they are a few feet away, will the tiny dots be that noticable anyway at the distance?

- if you're building it for people who don't know anything about ships, leave them off. At that scale, they're going to look more like dust spots or mistakes anyway. I had this same debate with myself while building the USS Enterprise; even though it was for someone currently serving on the Big E, I decided it was more important to get all the current sensors, radars, sponsons and weapons on it correct (this is the ancient Revell kit) than getting every persnickety detail right.

As far as tie downs on the larger scales, quite honestly, some of the 1/350 aircraft carrier models that feature the light-colored tie down holes - which may be technically correct for the time period depicted - look downright strange to me, and all the little white dots distract from what otherwise might be an excellent model.

If you have access to some close up images of the flight decks on the Nimitz class aircraft carriers, you will see that the tie downs are not painted any differently to the rest of the deck, but the non skid surface that is applied to the flight and hanger decks is not applied over the top of the tie downs and there is a slight variation in colour.

I believe that the navy did paint the tie downs on the USS Kitty Hawk CV 63 white, but it was not for a long period.

I have never seen a Nimitz class ship with white die downs or even haze grey.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Beau.